I Had A Dream About You
by monkey-in-hell
Summary: Post E6 drabble


A/N I adored Life On Mars. I have to admit that I never thought Ashes To Ashes could be as good but it's nice - in this instance - to be wrong. Episode Six even has me venturing back into fanfiction though I am a little rusty...

A/N 2 Why is there no Ashes To Ashes category? Anyone know how to get that fixed?

I Think I Had A Dream About You

Tired. She was so tired. The thought of slipping under the sheets and catching up on those lost hours seemed so appealing yet, at the same time, a little daunting. What lay there waiting for her was still an unknown quantity. She felt sure that it was now safe to fall asleep, the dream - the nightmare? - that had plagued her, that had pecked away at her thoughts, these last couple of days and had prevented her from blissful sleep lest it should mean peaceful death was now silent; her complete recollection - after solving the case - had nulled any fears it had provoked within her. Yet the final revelation of her dream had been unexpected.

With a sigh on her lips she avoided thinking further on that for now, just as she had done at the hospital with Donny and Evan. The visit had been distracting enough and she had been struck once more by the depth of reality that her brain had created, or recreated to be more exact. The smell of the hospital was as sharp as she remembered, the nurses correctly attired, the baby had mewled, and smelt, the way Molly had.

Molly.

She had to get back. Get back for Molly. She had to keep fighting for her daughter. She could not let herself believe she was already dead, she would keep fighting, keep looking for clues and signals that would lead her back to Molly.

"I'm not giving up," she whispered, moving towards the wall that held the piece of this nightmare that had to be her way back. Her parents' death day, marked with a small cross, stared back at her almost mockingly. The Xs she had used to mark each 'day' - and they did feel like twenty-four hours, each and every one of them - were mounting up at an alarming rate. But the blank boxes were diminishing just like her hopes.

"No, I'm not giving up," she repeated, louder this time, more determined. If she could save her parents, metaphorically speaking anyway, she could get back. It had to be the trigger - why else would her mind choose this year? The problem was she couldn't remember exactly the circumstances surrounding her parents' death. Whether that was a by product of her current situation or something that had plagued her real life too, she couldn't be sure. She was at the mercy of her own psyche and apparently it was more twisted than she'd have thought. But there were flashes of that day; of red, of feet, of her parents, of Evan...

Evan.

Why had she thought Evan had been the one in her bed? He was her Godfather or pity's sake, a duty he also performed for her own daughter. He was practically family. But the thought had been niggling her ever since she'd met Evan, if one could meet someone they already knew in a world constructed from their own mind; he was handsome, kind, caring, polite, easy going. Did she have these thoughts about him back in 2008? Subconsciously at least, she must have. Just as she must have known about his affair with her mother.

Mum.

She reached out to trace the cross that adorned one box of her home-made calendar. That she adored and loved her mother went without saying, that she found relating to Caroline Price as an adult difficult was another thing entirely. Somewhere in her mind she obviously felt her mother would be disappointed with her. This was supposed to be her world, her imagination - why would she make her mother that way? Is that how she had been? Had she only a romanticised memory of her parent, an image whittled away by time so that only the good remained, the hard edges smoothed? 

She removed her hand slowly, the tiredness pushing at her from all directions. Her ability to think after so little sleep was beginning to tell but her eyes lingered on the impending date. So little time left. And she had to figure this out. Arresting Layton had not got her home, neither had preventing the bombing or stopping the flood of guns into the capital. Would saving her parents really help her to get back? What if she was already dead? What if there was no way back?

Too tired, and scared, to go further down that road she slipped off her jacket and headed for her bedroom. Coming to a halt she eyed the bed suspiciously, the red sheets a reminder of that dream: of falling, endlessly falling into darkness, falling to her death? She kicked her boots off and whipped the sheets back quickly as if, like a plaster, it would be less painful than carefully inching it back. The terror of not knowing what she was going to find under the sheets had been the worst part, had made it so vivid. Sliding under the sheets she found the bed more comforting and welcoming than it had been in her dream. Actually, that wasn't true; once it became apparent that it was Gene next to her in the bed the whole dream took on a different meaning. 

Gene.

Why her mind had chosen to include Gene and his cronies in her world was a tricky one. Maybe because the Tyler case was playing heavily on her mind - she had found it all very intriguing and it would make a fascinating book, or it would have done anyway. Maybe her psyche was just lazy and after going to the effort of recreating early 80s London and the psychological trauma of her parents' death - that she was being forced to relive it would seem - coming up with new characters was too much, especially when some well drawn out alternatives were available. 

Trickier still was why she found herself attracted to Gene. Nothing in Tyler's accounts had stood out yet, in the flesh, there was something so magnetising about DCI Hunt. There were so many things that were wrong about him but so many things that she liked. She could put some of it down to the Alpha male theory; at a base level women were attracted to the most powerful males - and that was Gene Hunt in a nutshell. That part of her hoped that her dream would become a reality but another part of her worried about her sanity; none of this was real. Gene wasn't real. He wasn't even a construct of her own imagination but of Sam Tyler's. And just as Gene was Tyler's guide, he was becoming hers as well.

Oh yes, the dream had hinted at her attraction towards him but, more importantly, it had reinforced Gene's role as her protector in this world. He had saved her at the Cales' restaurant when she had been certain it was all over. Just as he had caught her in her dream. Familiarity was drawing her towards her mother and Evan, and towards a world that she had vague recollections of, but she was beginning to realise that she couldn't survive in this world without Gene.

Her eyes fluttered closed, the thought of sleep loudly calling her on, strangely enough with Gene's voice.


End file.
